Game Plan
by Sorida
Summary: TFA. After Bumblebee uploads himself to a video game, Megatron enters the Internet in order to carry out a new plan. When the others trap him in-game with Bumblebee, both are imprisoned. Bee must race against the clock to defeat Megatron on his own.


_Summary: Megatron tries to defeat the Autobots by using the Earth's Internet. At the exact moment he launches himself into the computers, Bumblebee decides to play his PC games by inserting his mind into the game. Once the plan is revealed, Ratchet manages to trap Megatron, but the Decepticon leader is with Bumblebee in the game._

_A/N: So, as I was looking through the TF: A Bumblebee stories, I was surprised to find no stories like this. I decided to do one myself. Hope you enjoy! Oh yeah, this takes place after "Transwarped" and before "Endgame." I like Prowl._

* * *

><p>"Bumblebee, come here! I have something to show you!" Sari shouted. The teenager paced around the Autobot rec. room for a few seconds before the sound of screeching tires filled the base. A yellow compact came zooming towards her from the hallway directly in front of her. Before crashing into the girl, the car transformed and skidded to a stop in robot mode.<p>

"No way! Do you have what I think you have?" Bumblebee asked, hardly containing his excitement.

"Only if you're thinking of twenty-two levels of nonstop awesomeness!" Sari replied, holding the package out for her friend to see.

"Yes!" Bee cheered, punching the air with his servos, "Ninja Gladiator: Revenge of the Samurai for PC! You rock Sari!"

"So, you wanna play?"

"Do you even need an answer for that?"

"Wait a minute," Sari realized that she hadn't heard any noise aside from Bumblebee trying to break the sound barrier to get to her. "Where are the others?"

"Well, Prowl's checking up on the Dinobots and searching for any residual transwarp energy from the whole Waspinator-Blackarachnia thing, Bulkhead's building the Space Bridge with your dad, and Optimus and Ratchet are on patrol. They should be back any minute now."

"Shouldn't we wait until they get back?"

"I'm sure it's fine. Besides, I've been waiting to play this game for six months. I thought my circuits were going to fry from the wait."

"Ok, I guess there's no harm in it. Besides, it's just a video game, what could happen?"

Famous last words Sari, famous last words.

* * *

><p>"Prime, we have to get back to base stat!" Ratchet shouted over his comm. link.<p>

"Why's that?" Optimus asked.

"I overheard Blitzwing shouting to the skies that Megatron planned on using the humans' 'World Wide Web' to give every computer hooked up to it a virus. That includes our base computers; we'd be completely defenseless."

"How do you know you can trust Blitzwing?"

"Have you heard the stuff he's been singing about recently? They're all about his encounters at the Youth Sectors which are all very accurate accounts of what happened there."

"Wait, he helped the Decepticons there?"

"He may act young, but that slagger's as old as Megatron himself."

"So, Megatron's going to use the Internet to cripple us?"

"I guess so, unless Blitzwing's trying to throw us off."

"Prime, I intercepted some Decepticon communication." A new voice entered the comm.-link.

"What did you hear Prowl?" Optimus asked.

"Megatron's preparing to launch his mind into the humans' Internet. You need to get back to base and use Teletraan 1 to trap him somewhere until we know how to either delete him from the mainframe or send him back into his physical body."

"I told you so." Ratchet said, unable to resist taunting Prime a bit.

"Alright, Autobots, roll out for base!"

* * *

><p>"Is it done downloading?" Sari asked, literally shaking from excitement.<p>

"3...2...1...Yes!" Bee cheered, "We are ready to play! And now that we finally have a good quality PC game, I've wanted to try something." A mischievous grin crept its way onto Bumblebee's faceplates.

"What?"

"Remember how I told you Prowl went into Omega Supreme's mind through a patch?"

"Yeah, why?"

"What if I did that, but for the video game and through the computer?"

"That would be the coolest thing ever! Is it safe?"

"Um...yes?"

"Bee, I don't know..."

"C'mon Sari, I promise you, nothing will happen. It's just a video game. Besides, you'll be playing outside of the game so, if something happens, you can jolt me out of it or something or I could do it."

"Do you even know how to get out of the game?"

"Well, I did try it before on the TV consol (don't tell Ratchet), so I've had experience. All I have to do is focus on my body or something in the base and I end up back in my body. Sari, I've done this so many times before, don't worry about it. Besides, how different could it be? I use the same entrance point and I've played similar games before. Nothing could possibly go wrong." Sari gave her friend a small smile.

"Ok, but once things start getting rough, pull yourself out of there."

"Alright, now let's kick some samurai skidplate!" Bumblebee cheered, revealing a small USB cable from his servo. The arrow on his helm slid up as he connected one end to his processor port and one to the computer. Clearing his thoughts, he focused solely on entering the game's mainframe. His optics off-lined as his mind travelled through the cord, never noticing the sound of four approaching engines and Sari's frantic voice.

* * *

><p>"Whoa," Bumblebee said quietly, looking around the landscape design, "so this is Level 1, huh? I guess I should see weapons I have to use." He quickly changed his servos into stingers, but noticed that his signature weapons had been...modified.<p>

The stingers had become longer and looked more like energy blades. Testing them out, he swung his right stinger into a nearby tree, slicing it clean through and setting the log on fire due to the weapon's electric charge.

"Ok, this is so cool!" the yellow mech cheered. His optics finally took in his surroundings now that his processor was over the "upgrades" high.

The area appeared to be some sort of forest, trees reaching up into the infinite sky above. A dirt road lay to his left, a field on his right, trees in front of him, and a pond behind him. Curiosity got the best of him and he walked over to the water. He immediately smiled at his reflection in the water.

His yellow armor had changed slightly as it usually did in video games his mind entered. The slightly bulky armor on his upper servos had shifted a bit, yellow now covering all of his servos up to the wheels in his shoulders. Two shuriken were added to his wheels, almost looking like spinners. His chassis was slimmer and his two back plates had "opened" up, giving the appearance of wings. Bumblebee smirked as he noticed his turbo boosters still there. His pedes, while his wheels remained in place, looked a bit like Prowl's, but smaller. Of course, he retained his original paint job.

For a few seconds, Bumblebee wondered why he wasn't given a katana like in the other games he entered. But it wasn't a huge deal, the stinger blades were a good trade-off. Through with scoping out his surroundings, Bumblebee finally noticed the lack of his techno-organic friend.

"Sari, where are you?"

* * *

><p>Sari groaned, shaking her head as Optimus berated her about letting Bee into the game. Ratchet was busy looking over the scout's body as Prowl worked out a way to communicate with the yellow mech.<p>

"He did what?" Optimus asked, nearly losing his cool completely.

"Ok, so he used that cord," Sari pointed to the slightly glowing USB-processor cord, "to enter the computer to play the game I just got." Suddenly, the main Autobot monitor blipped out, the city map replaced by static.

"Megatron's hacking us!" Ratchet called out. Bulkhead walked over to the now sparking consol and looked it over.

"I can stop it, but we'll need a temporary holding cell for Megatron." He said, facing his shocked friends. "What? I'm a Space Bridge genius and the same mechanics kind of apply to the computers. They're kind of modeled after Space Bridge consoles."

"Where would we put him?" Sari asked, "We don't have anything strong enough to hold him."

"How about a video game?" Prowl suggested. He was then met with shocked expressions. Shrugging, he said, "I'm assuming Bumblebee's done this many times before. That gives him an advantage over someone who's never experienced it before. If we can get Megatron trapped in the game, Bumblebee can keep him occupied long enough for us to find a way to get Megatron back into his own processor rather than our data files."

"As much as I don't like that idea, it is a brilliant one." Optimus replied, shaking his helm.

"It's the only one we've got Prime. It's that or let Megatron completely obliterate our data." Ratchet stated.

"Bulkhead, start relocating Megatron into the game, we can't risk the information in the central computers." Bulkhead nodded and began his work. He could send Megatron's essence over a wireless link provided by the Wi-Fi the base had. Once that happened, he'd have to have someone else shut down the Wi-Fi so Megatron wouldn't escape from his new "prison."

"Can't we find a way to communicate with Bee, to warn him?" Sari shouted. Bumblebee was going to be in for the fight of his life, he had a right to know about it.

"Actually, if we just turn on his comm. link, we'll be able to talk to him through that." Ratchet said, walking over to the prone youngling and gently pushing a button on the side of his yellow helm. "Here goes nothing." The medic then activated his.

* * *

><p>"Sari, come on already! Get your avatar out here and let's start kicking samurai aft!" Bumblebee shouted. He didn't want to start walking down the path without his friend by his side…or her character at least.<p>

"Bumblebee, can you hear me!" a voice rumbled, making the landscape shake. For a nanosec, Bumblebee thought the game was malfunctioning with him inside. Every Earth sci-fi story said NEVER to reset a game with someone inside of it. But then he recognized the voice and the aching in his processor from the noise. Bumblebee subconsciously brought a servo to his helm to activate the comm. link, but then remembered he was in a video game.

"Ratchet, is that you?" he called out. To his surprise, he got a reply.

"Kid, you're going to be in a lot of trouble once you get out of there."

"So, do you want me out?"

"No…you need to stay in there for an indefinite amount of time."

"Why? Is this my punishment or something, because it won't work?"

"No, Megatron's infiltrated our computers, so we need a place to keep him for a little while until we can figure out a way to get him back into his processor."

"He pulled the same stunt as me? That was stupid of him. The Internet's a whole lot different from a game."

"You've tried it before?" Ratchet's voice had an edge to it, almost daring him to try lying and see what would happen. Bumblebee decided spilling would be the best course of action.

"I tried it once (he heard a growl of annoyance from the medic) and the data stream almost knocked me into stasis. It's overwhelming and I pulled myself out in less than a nanosec. Trust me; I'm never doing that again."

"I thought so. Kid, we're going to be trapping him in your game for the time being."

"WHAT?"

"I told you he'd 'take it well.'" Sari's voice scoffed over the link.

"There's no way I can keep him busy on my own for over a few breems!" Bumblebee panicked. "Can't you guys come in here too?"

"Two problems with that little buddy," Bulkhead answered over his comm. "First off, we don't have any more of those cords (no clue where you got it anyway). Second, the computer can't sustain another Cybertronian in there once Megatron is in. We'd crash the game and…ah, I don't want to think about what could happen to you then."

"There's got to be something, anything!"

"Bumblebee, listen to me," Optimus voice rang over the link, "I know you can do this. We're all worried and we'll help in any way we can, but I'm assigning this to you as a mission. Stop Megatron at all costs and we'll try to get him out as quickly as possible."

"Alright," Bumblebee nodded, "I've got an idea. This game supports up to four players. Sari already has a PC controller and I've got two more in my room. If two of you could play with Sari, it may help hold Megatron off a little longer. Something tells me he's going to become a boss."

"A what?"

"Sorry Boss-bot, I forgot you don't really understand gaming language."

"I'll go get the controllers." Prowl offered.

"Right," Optimus said, "Sari, Prowl, and I will play the game. Ratchet will watch the monitor, just to make sure you're alright. Bulkhead will monitor everything else."

"Got it!" Bumblebee smiled, giving a thumbs-up at the sky. At least his friends could see his progress.

"Bee, get ready 'cause Megatron's coming in!" Bulkhead shouted. Bumblebee stumbled as the world around him shook violently, flinging him into a tree. A dark purple cloud filled the sky, swirling above the forest the scout was still inside. Suddenly, the swirling mass dove down into the large, multi-tier building on the horizon. The shaking stopped soon after and Bumblebee rose to his pedes.

"I'm assuming that was Megatron," Bee concluded, "and that he's the final boss. This is going to be interesting."

"Bumblebee, are you ok?" Sari yelled over someone's comm. link.

"Yeah, I'm fine. How're things out there?"

"Fine, everything went as planned. Ratchet cut the Wi-Fi, so Megatron's stuck in there with you. I'm getting the controllers set up for Optimus and Prowl. Do you know how many lives we'll have?"

"I think you guys start off with three. As you know, I…have one."

"Why didn't you tell me that earlier?"

"Because, usually, Megatron doesn't threaten my gaming experience!"

"How much can you take?"

"After the first few close-calls, I've built up my immunity. It's going to take a direct hit to my spark chamber to off-line me in game now."

"Close-calls?"

"Nothing really happened. I pulled myself out before anything could really happen. Hey, what's going on?" Bumblebee asked nervously as he felt the game's ground…shift slightly. It was like the game was transforming, changing all around him. Once the tremors stopped, the scout felt a bit different.

"There was a fluctuation in Megatron's activity." Prowl's voice cut in, "We don't know what he did, but something's changed in there."

"Optimus, maybe it would be better if Bee was out here to help us." Sari suggested.

"I think he'll be ok. Bumblebee, pull yourself out if things get too rough." Optimus addressed to both adolescents.

"You said that before Boss-bot. I know what I'm up against and I'll be fine." Bee replied coolly.

"Ok," the Prime sighed, "Sari's coming in now." After a second, nothing happened. Bumblebee saw something shimmer for a fraction of a nanosec, but it never became anything more than a trick of the light.

"Um…now what's going on up there?" he asked.

"I don't know! I should be able to enter the game through the Player 2 control." Sari's frustrated voice echoed. The pounding of buttons could be heard over the link. "The other player functions aren't responding either."

"Megatron changed the game's layout." Bulkhead said, "You guys can't get in, he put some sort of virus in it."

"He put a virus in the game? Ok, he is so getting slagged!" Bumblebee yelled, starting down the dirt path.

"Hold it youngling!" Bee stopped once the medic's voice came through to him, "If the virus affected the game, what did it do to you?"

"Nothing, I feel fine." he answered, looking at his servos as if they would give him an answer.

"Try getting out of there." Ratchet ordered.

"Ok…" The yellow mech focused on the feeling in his helm. The way he usually got out was by thinking about the cord linking his processor to the game. Information travelled to and from both ends, giving a means of entering and escaping. He tried to find that strange feeling, but came up empty. Panic overtook him as he searched frantically for it. To say he was surprised when a backlash of data came through his helm was an understatement.

Bumblebee cried out in pain, collapsing and clutching his helm in agony. There was some sort of firewall set up in front of the link. His processor could send data, but couldn't receive any from the computer, including his very essence. It was painfully obvious now: Megatron had trapped him.

"Guys…" he whispered, still in pain, "I'm kind of…stuck in here."

"Well this is fantastic," Ratchet's sarcasm was clear, "Megatron's trapped the kid in there with him and we can't send any help to him."

"Bumblebee," Optimus spoke softly, "you're going to have to find a way to get Megatron back into his body."

"Now how the slag am I going to do that?" Bee demanded, his body cleared of the pain. He stood up and leaned against a nearby tree, waiting for a reply.

"Wait, you can feel pain in there, right?" Sari asked.

"Yeah, why?"

"Maybe, once you get to him, launch every attack you've got and he'll be weak enough to retreat back to his body."

"I don't know if that will work. There's something about being outside your body that grants you some sort of immunity. You don't care for being wounded much because you know it doesn't apply to your actually body. It still hurts, but it's like a dream or memory purge. Of course, you can probably get killed in here. I mean, if you're processor-dead, you can't do much out there, right?"

"This is starting to sound a bit like a Cortical Psychic Patch." Ratchet remarked. "If the principles are similar, we should be able to get you out of there by pulling the plug. No, that would just trap you in a limbo. How do you know what you're doing?"

"I can be smart when I want to be!" Bumblebee pouted, "You guys don't give me enough credit."

"Says the bot who trapped us in a cave while Prowl was infected with Space Barnacles." Sari scoffed.

"Hey, whose side are you on here?"

"Whatever side can get you out in one piece and Megatron out of here."

"Hmm…good answer. So, what should I do now guys?"

"Start making your way to Megatron," Optimus said, "if the virus (or whatever it is) is feeding off of him for the energy to keep it going, you should be able to get out once he's weaker. You're going to have to fight Bumblebee. I hope you know what you're doing."

"Ok, but one question: if I do semi-slag Megatron and I can't get out, what then?"

"…"

"Guys? Hello! I'm waiting for an answer!"

"You'll be trapped in there," Ratchet began slowly, "you won't age, you won't deteriorate, nothing. You will be in there until someone or something shuts down the computer with you in it, which would be catastrophic, or until we found something that would get you out. Even then, your body would age without you and Primus knows what would happen after that."

"…You know, I kind of wish you never answered." Bumblebee attempted a bit of humor, but it came off as anxious and uncertain.

"You're best bet right now is to go after Megatron." Prowl offered, "I know, that hardly helps the situation, but it's the only option we have. Bulkhead's working on a way to get both of you out and we're thinking of everything we can. Don't worry, you won't be alone. At least one of us will be on the comm. link at a time."

"Ok Prowl," Bumblebee sighed, "what the slag did I get myself into?" he asked himself before walking down the dirt path.

* * *

><p>"Primus, what are we going to do?" Optimus asked, exasperated.<p>

"I wish I knew Prime." Ratchet replied, "The kid will be fine in there, it's getting him out that I'm more concerned about. He's done this before, so he knows how to fight with his processor. If we can't get him out…" he trailed off, unable to finish his thought.

"We'll get him out," Bulkhead reassured, "I'm working on isolating the source of the firewall. Before anyone asks, yes, this is from being a Space Bridge genius and yes, this does have to do with consol overrides. Honestly, I thought you'd all be used to it by now."

"That's not important right now," Prowl said, "we need to get Megatron out of there and Bumblebee's the only one who can do it at the moment, unless…"

"Um…I don't think I like the sound of that 'unless.'" Sari interrupted. Prowl glanced at her before continuing.

"Bulkhead, could you engineer a virus to weaken anything in-game?"

Bulkhead hesitated before answering, "Probably, it may take a few hours, but I could. But what would it do to Bee?"

"That's the part I didn't like," Prowl sighed, "if we can get it to weaken only Megatron for a few Earth seconds, then Bumblebee would have enough time to escape back to his own body before the full effect of it comes into play."

"And if Megatron isn't weakened enough and Bee's trapped in there when it hits?" Sari huffed.

"It's the only thing I could think of." was all the response Prowl could offer. Optimus decided to add his two cents to the conversation.

"I don't like it anymore than you do," he started, "but our first priority is protecting this planet and its inhabitants. If it does come down to creating another virus, we're going to have to do it. That game can't hold Megatron forever and even Bumblebee can't put up with him for that long."

"So, Bee could die?" Sari asked, worried for her best friend. The others gave her solemn optics, confirming her worst fears. After a few seconds of silence, she said, "Well, until that time comes, he's going to need all the help he can get."

"Yeah, but how?" Bulkhead turned to her, "We can't help with the game's multiplayer and there's no way to get a computer player to help either."

"Yeah, but I've got something better." the techno-organic replied with a triumphant smirk.

"What?" Optimus cut in.

"Two words Optimus: cheat codes." Sari smiled. "Since your Internet's down, I'll go back to Sumdac Tower and get as many as I can. It'll buy some time. I'll also try and find a step-by-step for it. There are twenty-two levels in that game and Bumblebee has no clue what he's up against in-game without Megatron. Plus, if we're on a time crunch, he's going to need the information. I just hope he gets past the fact that I'm going to spoil the entire thing for him," She shrugged, "but I guess there's nothing better."

"Ok, call us once you have the information."

"Is there any way you can get us an estimated amount of time for the completion of the game?" Prowl asked.

"Maybe, it just came out today. Why?"

"We're on a 'tight schedule.' If Bumblebee can't complete it in time…" the ninja-bot trailed off, the others obviously piecing together two and two.

"Ok, I'll do what I can and I'll call you guys once I find everything." Sari said, putting on her jetpack as she walked towards the exit. "Call me if Bee's having trouble. It's not that he's a bad gamer, it's just that…well, it is Bee we're talking about."

"I can't blame you there," Optimus sighed, smiling slightly, "just hurry with the information."

"Will do!" she yelled over her shoulder, taking off into the skies. If she' weren't in such a rush, she'd enjoy the flight a bit more, perform some aerial tricks, but the thought of Bumblebee trapped in-game kept her focused. There was no way she was losing her best friend over a freaking video game.

* * *

><p>"Ok, so the back of the game said 'travel far and wide, meet your allies and crush your enemies.' So, why's no one here?" Bumblebee mused to himself. Ten minutes had passed and he was still deep within the forest. The game's plotline had you start stranded at the very core of the forest with no memory of why you were there. That mystery would be revealed later on and, according to play testers, the reason was so obvious, it was impossible to guess. The yellow mech didn't have the time to muse on his speculations as rings of purple rippled across the sky.<p>

"That is such a Megatron thing to do," he said aloud, "make your presence known to the universe, why don't you! Well, I guess there's nothing else to do if you're an evil tyrant trapped inside of a T rated game. Wait, why am I talking to myself…and why haven't I transformed yet? I'm wasting time…" He started his transformation sequence and it worked…until immense pain ran throughout his body.

Bumblebee muted his scream as well as he could, still whimpering a bit as he went back to his robot form. That must be another Megatron-glitch: no transforming. He'd have to get through all the levels by _walking_. What was it the others had said?

"The game won't hold him for long," Bee relayed, now back to walking down the dirt path, "so it's kind of like a temporary holding cell. Depending upon how strong Megatron is, the game should hold up long enough for me to get to him, right? I mean, I can finish a Ninja Gladiator game with two hours without being plugged in. I can totally get to him in under that on a first run-through with my processor, right?" Bumblebee smacked his faceplate with a servo. "There's no fragging way in the Pit I can do that…

"Just for once, couldn't this have been non-consequential? Primus, are you laughing your aft off right now? Ugh, why does this stuff always end up happening? Here I am once again as I slagging decoy. Is that really all I am, a diversion? Sure as the Pit seems like it." He continued to rant and rave about his position, completely oblivious to the strange shadows in the trees. He couldn't sense the multiple sets of eyes watching him walk towards the deserted city of the Samurai Master, the City of Destruction as they called it.

Bumblebee's ranting was abruptly cut-off by a high-pitched whistling noise. He felt something move quickly past his faceplate and lodge itself into the tree to his left. Imbedded in the wood was a dagger with a blood-red ribbon wrapped around its handle. The scout gave it a startled glance before turning his helm to the source of the weapon, hearing the rustling of leaves. Quickly, his servos changed into dual swords, coursing with electricity.

"Show yourself, coward!" he screamed, silently adding an "I've always wanted to say that" in his processor. In response, another dagger was hurled at him, this time hitting its mark and piercing Bumblebee's left servo. He let out a small yelp before dodging three more daggers. Looking closely at the one inside his servo, he could clearly see the ribbon and the symbol on it. His optics widened and he tensed for battle.

There were two sides in the game, similar to the factions back on Cybertron. The one he was playing for used a strange shuriken-like design as their symbol. It was curved in a half-circle on the bottom and curved back in on itself to form a two-pronged shape. The other group, the enemies of the ninjas, had used a gold fire-breathing dragon as their insignia of choice. In a way, the ninjas represented the Autobots and the samurais were the Decepticons.

So, as his luck would have it, the first symbol he stumbled upon was a dragon. _Figures…_ Bumblebee thought as two samurai jumped from the trees, swords drawn and battle masks down. For the sake of authenticity, Bumblebee activated his mask as well before preparing for their imminent attack. His optics nearly widened as he gazed at their armor.

Of course Megatron went and put a Decepticon insignia on them. How predictable.


End file.
